100 years ago in Pullman: Students gather for telegraph updates from road football game

From our archives, 100 years ago

Washington State College students in Pullman were still recovering from a wild celebration after the football team’s overwhelming 29-0 victory over the Oregon Agricultural College (now Oregon State).

The game was played in Corvallis, yet hundreds of students had gathered in the gym in Pullman to listen to periodic telegraph bulletins about the game.

“Pandemonium broke loose with receipt of the first telegram” announcing a successful WSC kick. Yet that “first uproar was a mild affair compared to the veritable bedlam” of the later bulletins announcing the mounting score total.

That night all of Pullman was “wheezing and whispering” – having torn their vocal cords to shreds – yet was “still buzzing with enthusiasm that literally knows no bounds,” reported a correspondent. A huge bonfire was built on the downtown streets “and horns and cowbells” were doing what voices could not.

A sportswriter on the scene in Corvallis reported that the Oregon Aggies were “completely outclassed in every department of the game.”

The star player was “Durham, the little Spokane boy,” who was both a running back and expert kicker.

The result was “the sweetest victory Pullman has known in years.”